Charles Plum, a U.S. Naval Academy graduate, was a jet fighter pilot in Vietnam. After
75 combat missions, his plane was destroyed by a surface-to-air missile. Plumb ejected and
parachuted into enemy hands. He was captured and spent six years in a Communist prison. He
survived that ordeal and now lectures about lessons learned from that experience.

One day, when Plumb and his wife were sitting in a restaurant, a man at another table
came up and said, "You're Plumb! You flew jet fighters in Vietnam from the aircraft
carrier Kitty Hawk. You were shot down!"

Plumb couldn't sleep that night, thinking about that man. Plumb says, "I kept
wondering what he might have looked like in a Navy uniform -- a Dixie cup hat, a bib in
the back, and bell bottom trousers. I wondered how many times I might have passed him on
the Kitty Hawk. I wondered how many times I might have seen him and not even said 'Good
morning, how are you,' or anything because, you see, I was a fighter pilot and he was just
a sailor."

Plumb thought of the many hours the sailor had spent on a long wooden table in the
bowels of the ship carefully weaving the shrouds and folding the silks of each chute,
holding in his hands each time the fate of someone he didn't know.

Now, Plumb asks his audience, "Who's packing your parachute? Everyone has someone
who provides what they need to make it through the day." Plumb also points out that
he needed many kinds of parachutes when his plane was shot down over enemy territory -- he
needed his physical parachute, his mental parachute, his emotional parachute, and his
spiritual parachute. He called on all these supports before reaching safety. His
experience reminds us all to prepare ourselves to weather whatever storms lie ahead.

SUGGESTION: Recognize and be gracious to people who pack your daily parachutes, and
strengthen yourself to prevail through tough times.